This means that while owners of Panasonic's Blu-ray recorder can timeshift HD programmes to the hard drive, they are prohibited from copying the material to a Blu-ray media in hi-def form.

This is in stark contrast to BBC HD which is currently flagged Copy Once, and should soon move to Copy Always.

Panasonic's Marketing Manager David Preece told HCC: 'We're currently talking to ITV about this, along with Freesat, and hope to persuade them to move to a Copy Once position before the launch of our recorders on 1 June.'

Preece admits that reaching out to the commercial broadcaster has been less straightforward than talking to the BBC, because of its different operating structure.

Dubbing Ten

The UK's digital recording scenario is very different from that in Japan, where Blu-ray recorders have already proved a huge commercial success.

There, broadcasters adhere to a 'Dubbing Ten' system, which allows broadcast hi-def programmes to be copied up to 10 times, using any combination of HDD and blank media.

If Panasonic is unsuccessful in convincing ITV HD to play ball, it could undermine the launch of Blu-ray recorders altogether.

The general public is highly unlikely to buy into a recording technology that only works with certain channels.